Making a Run for It, Hollywood Style

(Editor’s note: This is the fourth recent piece by Rap Sheet contributor Anthony Rainone, who has been reflecting on real crimes and how they relate to fictional characters facing similar circumstances. You can enjoy all of Anthony’s previous posts here.)

On June 6, 2015, prisoners Richard Matt, 48, and David Sweat, 35, broke out of the Clinton Correctional Facility, a maximum-security state prison located in Dannemora, New York. At the same time as that getaway set off a massive manhunt that continues today, it caused various news media to compare the incident, if only fleetingly, to the 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption, which starred Tim Robbins as Andy Dufresne and Morgan Freedman as Ellis Boyd “Red” Redding.

There are some similarities, to be sure. Matt and Sweat placed dummies in their beds, dug through brick, made their way along interior corridors, cut through pipes with power tools, and emerged outside the prison walls through a manhole cover. Andy Dufresne did not use power tools to escape from Maine’s (fictional) Shawshank State Penitentiary, though he did employ a small ball-peen hammer to break through his wall and dig down to the sewer pipes which also served as his means of escape through the bowels of the prison. Of course, Red Redding walked out of prison a free man, but broke his parole to meet up with Dufresne in Mexico--a locale to which some people thought Matt and Sweat would also head.

Yet the manhole cover escape immediately brought to mind another favorite film, the 1998 caper tale, Out of Sight, starring George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez. Based on the 1996 Elmore Leonard novel of the same name, that picture at one point finds convicted bank robber Jack Foley (played by Clooney) emerging from beneath a manhole cover only to find himself staring down the barrel of a gun held by U.S. Marshall Karen Sisco (Lopez). The similarity extends further in that Matt and Sweat expected to see a woman when they exited their own manhole: accomplice and 51-year-old civilian prison tailor employee Joyce Mitchell.

Parallels end there, though one could technically extend them a bit further, since prisoner Matt seemed to have a sexual relationship with Mitchell, while Clooney’s Foley enjoyed a romantic attraction to Sisco. Clearly, Foley’s was the more admirable liaison, since Mitchell seemed to be merely a pawn in the Dannemora escape plans.

The recent New York fleeing also brings to mind another of my favorite prison-breakout movies: Escape from Alcatraz. Based on true events, that 1979 film starred Clint Eastwood as convicted armed robber Frank Morris and Patrick McGoohan as the sinister Warden. In 1962, the multiple-offending Morris used a sort-of power tool to undo bolts on a shaft vent; he’d rigged the thing from a fan motor and a drill bit. And let’s not forget the dummy head that Morris left on his prison bed.

Ruining the continuity thread, Morris did not go underground or utilize pipes in his daring flight. Instead, he crossed the roof of Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary together with his accomplices, climbed down a wall, climbed over a fence, and used a makeshift raft assembled from raincoats to cross surrounding San Francisco Bay. Morris and his cohorts, the brothers Clarence and John Anglin, were never found and--though they’d be very old men by now--might still be at large. Most presumed they died crossing the frigid waters fraught with strong currents. But many believe Frank Morris eventually made his way to Mexico--the desired flee-to location for Matt and Sweat as well.

Maybe Morris, Dufresne, and Redding all enjoyed drinks with umbrellas on the beach. I could live with that.

Life imitates art/imitates life doesn’t fully apply to the case of Richard Matt and David Sweat, of course. There’s a serious departure. Shawshank’s Dufresne was wrongly convicted of murdering his wife and her lover. Out of Sight’s Jack Foley was a gentleman bank robber with charm and morals--he was not a violent man. Frank Morris was a convicted armed robber, certainly a serious matter, but Eastwood managed to make his character sympathetic and gruffly likable, if not entirely innocent.

Matt and Sweat, on the other hand, are cold-blooded killers. There is nothing romantic or likable about these men, one of whom murdered a deputy, while the other killed and dismembered his victim. Unlike Dufresne or Morris, the recent escapees in New York state deserve to be apprehended and serve out their life sentences. Their story does not merit a happy cinematic ending.

FOLLOW-UP: “Sprawling Hunt Ends as David Sweat, 2nd Prison Escapee, Is Shot and Captured,” by Rick Rojas, J. David Goodman, and William K. Rashbaum (The New York Times).

“Your Verdict Must Be Unanimous”

(Above) Lee J. Cobb as Juror No. 3.

(Editor’s note: This is the third recent piece by Rap Sheet contributor Anthony Rainone, who has been reflecting on real crimes and how they might have been dealt with by fictional characters facing similar cases. You’ll find Anthony’s previous posts here and here.)

The United States is embroiled in the aftermath of three fairly recent grand jury decisions: one by a Missouri grand jury that exonerated former Ferguson County Police Officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Michael Brown; a second by a Staten Island, New York, grand jury declining to indict NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo in the chokehold death of Eric Garner; and a third decision--the most recent--by a Brooklyn, New York, grand jury that did deliver an indictment of NYPD Officer Peter Liang in the shooting death of Akai Gurley.

All three of the deceased were unarmed African-American men, and in the last instance, the victim had not even been engaged by the police in any manner. The two exonerations and the single indictment riled racial tensions amongst all nationalities, both across the country and the world. All three verdicts were met with incredulity by various groups of Americans, none of whom seemed able to agree with the others. I wondered how this could be, and who could help the country come to understand the verdicts?

I was reminded of the acclaimed 1957 movie 12 Angry Men, starring Henry Fonda, Lee J. Cobb, E.G. Marshall, and Jack Warden, to name just four actors in the star-studded cast. So I decided to rewatch that brilliant Sidney Lumet-directed trial film, to see if I could better understand the thinking process that might have gone on in the real grand jurors’ heads.

Mind you, a grand jury proceeding is significantly different from the deliberations depicted in that 57-year-old big-screen picture. For example, grand juries will often hear several cases during a week and they comprise more than 12 sitting jurors (usually a number somewhere in the 20s).

Still, a comparison between a grand jury and a dozen jurors locked in a room deciding a criminal case can be made based on certain similarities, such as witness testimony and submitted evidence--as well as the emotional, intellectual, and cultural underpinnings brought to the deliberations by the men and (in the modern cases, at least) women involved in hearing a case. These basic ingredients do not change.

(Left) Fonda as Juror No. 8.

12 Angry Men is based on an outstanding screenplay by Reginald Rose, who drew on his own experience with such a trial jury. It is a brilliant rendering of the social, economic, and personality quirks that can influence a case, almost as much as the facts do.

The jurors in the film find themselves battling preconceived notions before they are able to arrive at the truth about a 19-year-old Hispanic boy’s alleged, fatal stabbing of his father. The exception is Juror No. 8 (Fonda). As I watched the film, I wondered if this happened in Missouri and New York. I wondered if there was a Juror No. 8 present during those deliberations, who helped his cohorts come to their ultimate conclusion, or one lacking and thus causing the proceedings to teeter towards folly.

Let me state: I am not suggesting that the grand juries in Missouri and New York did or did not arrive at the truth, or the proper legal decision. I’m simply exploring the possibilities that led to two dismissals (which might have otherwise resulted in the defendants being acquitted at trial anyway) and one indictment.

When the prosecutors in the Michael Brown and Eric Garner cases decided to present all the evidence, I couldn’t help but think that Fonda’s Juror No. 8 would have relished that result. He would have taken the testimony of hands raised or not (Michael Brown), chokehold or submission hold (Eric Garner), and he would have re-enacted and examined each moment, until he was as sure of the facts as he could be. Much like he did in the movie, re-enacting the testimony of the old man who said he’d made it from his bedroom to his front door in 15 seconds (when it actually took 42 seconds).

Fonda’s character, also identified at the end of the film as “Mr. Davis,” fulfilled roles as juror and defense lawyer, taking up the defense mantle dropped by the youthful defendant’s court-appointed attorney. In a grand jury proceeding, there would be no defendant or defense lawyer present, which would only underscore Juror No. 8’s importance. His is the voice of the accused. The fictional defendant would have found himself on death row, if not for Juror No. 8’s tenacity in examining the evidence with a clear eye devoid of prejudice and societal influences. Was such a voice badly needed in all three of those recent grand jury proceedings?

It has been argued that the prosecutors in both Missouri and New York presented the evidence in a way that favored the police. I wondered what the men and women comprising those grand juries asked the two officers under suspicion (Wilson and Pantaleo both testified, whereas Liang declined). Again, I am not criticizing the seated juries, who had exceptionally difficult cases to weigh. I am simply wondering if the arguments ever got as loud and raucous as those in the cinematic jury room. I am wondering if there was a grand juror such as Angry Men’s Joseph Sweeney’s character, Juror No. 9, who closely examined the physicality of each witness and hit upon key elements that helped break the case. I’m not saying there was anything to uncover, but I wonder whether such a grand juror would have brought his or her scrutiny and voice to bear on the verdicts to indict or not.

Taking license, I could easily see Lee J. Cobb’s Juror No. 3 sitting in either the Missouri or New York grand jury room thinking that justice was served: Brown and Garner resisted arrest and brought about their own tragic ends. That is, as Cobb’s character existed for nearly the entire movie, until the end of Act II, when Juror No. 8 finally shredded the prejudicial mantle that Juror No. 3 had draped around himself.

What do these verdicts say about the United States today? That the racial divides of the past still exist, but that our justice system nonetheless strives to pursue the truth. Sometimes we get it right, and other times we miss. Sometimes Juror No. 8 is in each and every jury room, and sometimes his spirit is sorely lacking.

* * *

A trailer for 1957’s 12 Angry Men is embedded below.

Ending the Real-life “Chinatown” Water Feud

(Above) Frequent dust storms remain an environmental problem on California’s Owens Lake. (Photo from the Owens Lake Project.)

By Anthony Rainone

What can I tell you, kid? You’re right. When you’re right, you’re right, and you’re right.

Those lines from the opening scene of Chinatown (1974) are pretty much what the City of Los Angeles is now saying to the many folks who reside in eastern California’s Owens Valley, according to this article in The New York Times. Trouble is, it took more than a century for L.A. to finally make that admission.

Current Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti stated not long ago that his city is culpable for the considerable air pollution that has resulted from the diversion of water, beginning in 1913, from Owens Lake to L.A., 200 miles to the south. “They took the water,” he remarked, acknowledging the actions of his predecessors--and looking forward to efforts by the city to help clean up the long-standing environmental mess. (As a report by National Public Radio explained, in 2013 Owens Lake--now “a salt flat the size of San Francisco”--was “the largest single source of dust pollution in the nation.”)

(Left) Jack Nicholson in Chinatown.

As part of my ongoing exploration of art imitating life imitating art, and how various fictional and cinematic characters would respond to current topics, I wondered how 1930s private investigator J.J. “Jake” Gittes (played by Jack Nicholson), who uttered those opening lines, would feel about this final resolution to the controversy. Before the Big Reveal in its second act, Chinatown was all about water. It was Gittes who inadvertently discovered a conspiracy to steal water from the farmers and ranchers living in the Owens Valley and divert it to the fast-growing L.A. metropolis.

Of course, the fictional conspiracy so brilliantly rendered by screenwriter Robert Towne and director Roman Polanksi was based on the true-life theft of water from Owens Valley, perpetrated in the 20th century’s first two decades by William Mulholland, superintendent of what was then the Los Angeles City Water Company (later the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power). Mulholland and his cronies in city government didn’t resort to exploiting an old-age home, as depicted in the movie, but their subterfuge was every bit as damning. As a fictional chamber of commerce official states in Chinatown, the water is necessary to “keep the desert” off the streets of L.A., no matter the cost to farmers in human suffering.

In the film, Mulholland is transformed into the fictional Hollis Mulwray (Darrell Zwerling), who is suspected of cheating by his supposed wife (Diane Ladd). Gittes is hired to investigate, and he tails Mulwray to the Los Angeles River basin and then out to the Pacific Ocean. The first half of the movie is replete with water references: a car overheating, Gittes nearly drowning in a drainage pipe, a client of Gittes who is a fisherman, and Mulwray’s gardener uttering the confounding statement “bad for glass,” while knee-deep in a pond. After the Big Reveal, the imagery shifts to the seedy side of Los Angeles, but it never completely forgoes the significance of water. One could argue that the absence of morality in Chinatown (the downtown L.A. neighborhood where Gittes once worked as a cop, and where this movie’s action concludes) is an offshoot of urban impurity far removed from the life-giving essence of water.

(Right) Mulholland with surveying equipment, circa 1920s.

So what would Jake make of the new agreement to curb pollution in the Owens Valley? First, he’d laugh ironically at how the city stole water from the area only to end up pouring a costly “twenty-five billion gallons of water annually” on Owens Lake, just to control the resulting dust. Then he would wonder why the city has finally come to accept its responsibility. What kind of backroom deal was struck? Who is making money off this arrangement? That is something the self-conscious and proud Jake Gittes would be compelled to investigate, since he was made to look like such a fool in the first go-round.

The Times article suggests that perhaps the water theft wasn’t a total loss to the Owens Valley, because it kept the local population down and preserved the natural beauty of the region. I would add that it also inspired one of the finest films ever made in the noir genre.

Old Clues, New Interest

By Anthony Rainone
I recently reviewed Michael Connelly’s The Burning Room for January Magazine. Shortly after that, I came across this article in The New York Times, which echoes one of the major plot points in the novel. And I couldn’t help but wonder how Connelly’s Los Angeles police detective, Hieronymus “Harry” Bosch, might have handled the case.

Let’s recap: In The Burning Room, Bosch investigates the shooting, 10 years ago, of Mariachi musician Orlando Merced, who was believed at the time to have been hit in a random gang-banger drive-by. As a member of the LAPD Open-Unsolved Unit, Bosch is assigned the case, even though Merced only recently passed away from his wounds. Because he was shot a decade prior to his demise, and his ultimate passing was due to complications from the shooting, the coroner rules Merced’s death a homicide.

Now, the Times tale: Back in 1959, early on a rainy New York City morning, Antonio Ciccarello left his apartment on East Fifth Street and Avenue C on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and headed toward his job as a porter at a building on 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue. Shortly after setting out, however, Ciccarello was stabbed in the torso by an unknown assailant. An operation to save his life was successful. Unlike the fictional Merced, who ended up in a wheelchair, Ciccarello had no recurring disabilities from his attack. Fast forward 55 years. On September 16, 2014, Mr. Ciccarello dies at the ripe old age of 97--and to the surprise of his family, his body is sent to the medical examiner’s office, because his hospital records indicate the stabbing back in 1959. The medical examiner rules that Mr. Ciccarello’s death is “stabbed by other … homicide.”

When I read this news account, I immediately thought of Bosch. It’s the kind of mystery and injustice that have always fed the flames of his personal mission: Everyone counts or no one counts. Someone stabbed Ciccarello and that person has to be caught.

Yet, there is a significant difference between how L.A. and New York treat cold cases. While Bosch’s Open-Unsolved Unit is handed the investigation following Merced’s death, the case of Ciccarello was given to the Manhattan South Homicide Squad, not a cold-case squad.

This was a juicy bone to chew over. I could imagine Bosch arguing with his superiors to be assigned the case, suspecting “high jingo” or department politics as the reason why the investigation wasn’t automatically tossed over to Open-Unsolved. It wouldn’t take long for Detective Bosch to wear down his superiors’ resistance. Or he’d call in a favor in order to appeal directly to the police chief, and either way he’d get what he wants.

Although porter Ciccarello always maintained he didn’t recognize his assailant, NYPD Lieutenant Detective Michael Saccone was quoted in the Times saying, “random attacks are rare. … Mr. Ciccarello could have known who stabbed him and did not want to tell anyone.”

In The Burning Room, Merced’s shooting is similarly considered a haphazard assault, until Harry Bosch digs deeper into the story. Who knows what Bosch could come up with in the Ciccarello case? While the victim’s family has stated that Ciccarello had no enemies (“He was a porter, he didn’t have anybody against him.”), Bosch would likely find just the right thread to pull and thereby unravel the mystery, confounding everyone, especially the doubters.

The challenges would be considerable: there is no DNA evidence, and most witnesses to Antonio Ciccarello’s 1959 stabbing died long ago. Still, I’d love to see Bosch take a run at this puzzling cold case. If Ciccarello’s killer is still alive, Bosch would surely find him.